Genesis 28 Devotional

God in an Unexpected Place

“Look, I am with you, and I will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. For I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.””Genesis 28:15 (BSB)

Jacob leaves home as a fugitive, alone, with a stone for a pillow. He has deceived his father and cheated his brother, and nothing in the chapter suggests he is looking for God. But God comes looking for him. In a dream Jacob sees a ladder reaching from earth to heaven, with God's angels going up and down on it, and the LORD standing above it (28:12-13). God repeats to Jacob the promises he gave Abraham and Isaac, and adds a personal one: he will be with him, watch over him, and not leave him until he has done everything he promised (28:15).

Jacob wakes up saying the LORD was in that place and he had not known it (28:16). Jesus later told Nathanael that he would see heaven opened and angels ascending and descending on the Son of Man (John 1:51). Jesus himself is the way between heaven and earth. Wherever you are running from or toward, God's presence can meet you there.

To think about: Where might God be present in your life right now in a way you have not yet noticed?